Welcome to 2009, prestige-junkies. As the new year turns, so does Dame Fortune's wheel ... and on the off-chance you aren't already on top of this, you should know that Mickey Rourke is tipped for an Oscar nomination.

Do just allow that to sink in. A decade ago, those were the words you were second most unlikely to hear in Hollywood. (The words you were first most unlikely to hear were: "Andie MacDowell is tipped for an Oscar nomination." That remains the case for all time.)

Fact is, Mickey's career path has been mazy. In 1991, he quit acting for boxing, where, despite remaining unbeaten, his age saw him pick up injuries ranging from a split tongue to a compressed cheekbone. No longer a matinee idol, he returned to cinema in 1995, gifting the world straight-to-video releases such as Another 9 ½ Weeks, which, I have to tell you, lacked the meticulous plotting of the first instalment. But now, in a frankly astonishing turnaround, Mickey has serious best actor buzz for The Wrestler, and is being feted all over town for his performance as a washed-up grappler.

Yet despite having returned from the wild to the rarefied air of Hollywood, Mickey's behaviour remains somewhat primitive - a bit like in Greystoke when they bring Christopher Lambert back to England. He's definitely winsome, but God, could he please use a spoon for that soup?

In Mickey's case, these atavistic impulses can take the form of indiscriminate texting, and one of his SMS messages has somewhat awkwardly found its way into the public domain.

It concerns his awards race rival, none other than Sean Penn, who stars in the Oscar-bait biopic of the first openly gay US politician, Harvey Milk. Milk - subtitle: Don't Deny Me My Fauxmosexual Rights to a Best Actor Statuette Like You Did to Heath Ledger - is also tipped to draw accolades from the academy, but according to his leaked text message, Mickey has reservations about its star turn.

"Look seans a friend of mine," it begins - and you'll detect the caveat. Some of my best friends are Sean Penns. "I didn't buy his performance at all," Mickey continues. "Thought he did an average pretend acting like he was gay besides he's one of the most homophobic people I kno [sic]."

Well that just can't be true. Can it? I guess Sean's in awe of a certain profoundly homophobic revolutionary, having held a hilarious series of bilateral talks with Fidel Castro's brother Raul. (Incidentally, how can any self-respecting revolutionary be homophobic? It makes them look like such petit bourgeois part-timers. You just know that Castro supports Manchester United, but couldn't name a single United side pre the signing of Eric Cantona.)

But no - the implication that Sean Penn took on the role of Best Actor Harvey Milk for any other reason than a burning sense of empathy for the old queen is preposterous in the extreme.

Still, Mickey's thoughts are now out there, and as one veteran Hollywood lawyer has commented: "Mickey should be looking at this as a once-in-a-career chance for a fresh start. But dumping on Penn is not going to win him any friends. It's not the way to get Oscar votes."

Thus this week found Mickey's publicist firefighting. "There is no Oscar feud between Mickey and Sean," the beleaguered PR insisted. "They have known each other and been friends for a very long time. Mickey attended the New York premiere of Milk to support Sean and only has the greatest respect for him."

Unfortunately, she declined to call the text a fake, and would only say that "Mickey is completely unaware of the text". Mm. Mickey is also completely unaware that he starred in a 2001 cockroach horror movie called They Crawl. But Lost in Showbiz has seen it, and can assure you it's very, very real.